To use an ancient Greek aesthetic distinction, the two bunches of wind turbines that I have ever seen -- just north of LA, on some rolling treeless steep hills, and in southwestern Kansas, on a treeless plain -- were not so much "beautiful" as "sublime."  That is, they did not elicit a sense of serenity, harmony and peace; rather, I was more impressed by their power and magnificence, their amazing awesomeness.

There are some machines, whose function involves the collection of energy, of which there are many indisputably beautiful examples.  They include pre-industrial water mills; the original Old-World windmills, such as those in Greece, Holland and La Mancha, Spain; and boats and ships powered by sail.  Some sailing ships can be sublime without ceasing to be beautiful.

For beauty's sake, material matters, and size matters.  The closer to hand-made, by human hands, the better.  The closer to human-scale, the better.

I never thought it would be possible to make an ugly big sailing vessel.  And yet that has been done.  The racing yachts designed to compete for the America's Cup are shockingly dull.  They are just a lot of pumped-in carbon-based molecules, of a certain weight, fitted into a digitally designed mould, of a certain shape.  The mind of these designers and makers is admirable enough; their eye, however, is questionable.  Remembering one of these boring, recyclable, trashable harbor-cloggers, a Katharine Hepburn could never imaginably say to a Carey Grant (as she did about an elegant sailing vessel in "The Philadelphia Story"), "My, she was yar."

When our craftsmen are true artisans, working with materials that themselves are pleasant to look at or feel, and alive to what a finished product can look like, and agreeing that what the product looks like matters, then there remains the strong possibility that they will create something beautiful, including windmills, sailing ships, bell towers and their bells, clock towers and their clocks.  But when all that matters is the numbers in record-keepers' books, not what the thing looks like, feels like, smells like, sounds like, then those craftsmen are not going to be able to give us anything better, aesthetically, than those boring plastic boats, and these unappealing wind turbines.

And so, aesthetically at least, the story of wind turbines is not promising so far.  It is hard to see how they can be considered truly beautiful: first because they are too big, far beyond a scale in which human beings can control them; secondly because they are made of materials that are incomprehensible to most human beings, produced, shaped, transported and erected in ways that are utterly incomprehensible, and anyway are not in themselves pleasing to look at; thirdly because the shape of every part is formed by research done by ivory-tower specialists, referring always, consistently, to efficiency models, not to considerations of appearance.

I am highly in favor of the development of wind farms; I am in favor of the Cape Wind project; and I suspect the wind turbines there will add to the interest of the seascape, a few miles off Cape Cod.  Nevertheless, it is not at all clear that they would be beautiful.  Very likely sublime; but not beautiful.  That should not be an obstacle to going ahead with the project.  But we fans of wind power should acknowledge that the objections of opponents on aesthetic grounds are not unreasonable.

Many people view lighthouses as aesthetically beautiful, worthy of postcards, calendars, and art exhibitions.  Perhaps some of this this beauty is because of their historical context of beacons of safety...and of course because of their elegant construction and design, in many cases.  

Are not wind turbines beacons of a clean energy future, of safety through a reduction in pollution?  Can they not be constructed elegantly?

I wonder if lighthouses were considered beautiful when they were first constructed?  I do not know...but I believe that when we can recognize the factors which make these monstrous, light-emitting towers pleasing to the human eye then we may be able to apply these same principles to both the design as well as the public perception of wind turbines.  

Old-fashioned lighthouses, i.e. those involving masonry and a conical-section structure, are indeed considered beautiful by many people.  Thanks, Robstenger, for mentioning them.

The Pharos of Alexandria, a Hellenistic-Greek construction, in Ptolemaic Egypt, one of the greatest architectural projects defining Hellenistic civilization, is usually numbered among the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.  It has not survived, but a few representations have.  No doubt it was especially impressive for uniting within a single image and idea the four Empedoclean elements, earth, water, air, fire, all comprehended and controlled by human reason and industry, represented by the admirable geometry of the lighthouse tower.  No doubt the idea of the Pharos as a benefaction to seafarers, made possible by the Ptolemies, the benefactors, the Greek kings and queens of Egypt, the last of whom was Cleopatra, was intended to be present in every image, and especially so in the spectacular view of the Pharos itself, alas forever lost.  But I think that connexion between the astounding tower's usefulness to humanity and the benefaction of a race of divine-seeming kings and queens surely tends to place the tower more in the category of "the sublime" than "the beautiful."

The American painter Edward Hopper (1882-1967), inspired by many examples of many kinds of American vernacular architecture, found in lighthouses a worthy subject.  No doubt he loved the shapes of the buildings, their situation on a rugged coast, the coastal sunlight shining on them, the conical-section, candy-striped towers.  Unclear if he thought much about the people who lived in them, or about the folks in boats at sea who relied on their light at night.

And I know nothing about whether the automated coastal lights, now in place, performing the function of those old lighthouses, have been recognized as a worthy subject by any artist.  It is very possible; but I suspect that would have more to do with how they look, than with what good they bring to society.

I share your hope, Robstenger, that wind turbines be recognized as beautiful things.  I do not share your hopefulness.